Well I have never achieved it (which is NOT the same as saying it cant be done). I do have a workround though, but you might find it too complicated to bother with, it consists of this.

1) Get a gmail account

2) Install checkgmail

3) Go to your ISP's mail account settings and set up a message rule to forward a copy of all your mail to your gmail account (you should be able to choose to leave the message on the server as well if you wish).

This way you get a notification every time there is an email and you can choose to open it in google mail or thunderbird whichever you prefer. It has the advantage that you have an automatic backup of all your mail on google's servers.

Probably not at all what you are looking for, but it does work, I have been using it for years.